The "Pause" - A Review of Its Significance and Importance to Climate Science 77

[rconnor]

----------Introduction---------
A comparison of recent temperature trends in isolation of earlier data, say 1998-present, to long(er)-term temperature trends, say 1970-present, reveals that more recent temperature trends are lower than long-term temperature trends. This has led many, including many prominent climate scientists, to refer to the recent period as a “pause”, “hiatus” or “slowdown”. While in isolation of any other context besides two temperature trends, the term “pause” or “hiatus” may be quasi-accurate, much more context is required to determine whether these terms are statistically and, more importantly, physically accurate.

It should be noted that most times when these terms are used by climate scientists, they keep the quotation marks to indicate the mention-form of the word and are not implying an actual physical pause or hiatus in climate change. The subsequent research into the physical mechanism behind the “pause” has continually demonstrated that it is not indicative of a pause in climate change nor does it suggest a drastic reduction in our estimates of climate sensitivity. However, this fact appears to be lost on many who see the “pause” as some kind of death-blow to the anthropogenic climate change theory or to the relevancy of climate change models.

While this subject has been discussed repeatedly in these forums, it has never been the focus but rather used as a jet-pack style argument to change the conversation from the subject at hand to the “pause” (“Well that can’t be right because the Earth hasn’t warmed in X years!”). Revisiting past threads, I cannot find an example of where someone attempted to defend the “pause” as a valid argument against anthropogenic climate change. It is brought up, debunked and then not defended (and then gets brought up again 5 posts later). The hope is to discuss the scientific literature surrounding the “pause” to help readers understand why the “pause” is simply not a valid argument. While some points have been discussed (usually by me) before, this post does contain new research as well as 2014 and 2015 temperature data, which shed even more light on the topic. The post will be split into three parts: 1) the introduction (and a brief discussion on satellite versus surface station temperature data sets), 2) Does the “pause” suggest that climate change is not due to anthropogenic CO2? and 3) Does the “pause” suggest that climate models are deeply flawed?

------Why I Will Be Using Ground-Based Temperature Data Sets-------
Prior to going into the meat of the discussion, I feel it necessary to discuss why I will be using ground-based temperature data sets and not satellite data sets. Perhaps one of the most hypocritical and confused (or purposefully misleading) arguments on many “skeptic” blogs is the disdain for all ground-based temperature data sets and the promotion of satellite temperature data sets. The main contention with ground-based temperature data sets is that they do not include raw data and require homogenization techniques to produce their end result. While I am not here (in this thread) to discuss the validity of such techniques, it is crucial to understand that satellite temperature data sets go through a much more involved and complex set of calculations, adjustments and homogenizations to get from their raw data to their end product. Both what they measure and where they measure it are very important and highlights the deep confusion (or purposeful misdirection) of “skeptic” arguments that ground-based temperatures are rubbish and satellite-based temperatures are “better”.

[ul][li]Satellites measure radiances in different wavelength bands, not temperature. These measurements are mathematically inverted to obtain indirect inferences of temperature (Uddstrom 1988). Satellite data is closer to paleoclimate temperature reconstructions than modern ground-based temperature data in this way.[/li]
[li]Satellite record is constructed from a series of satellites, meaning the data is not fully homogeneous (Christy et al, 1998). Various homogenization techniques are required to create the record. (RSS information)[/li]
[li]Satellites have to infer the temperature at various altitudes by attempting to mathematically remove the influence of other layers and other interference (RSS information). This is a very difficult thing to do and the methods have gone through multiple challenges and revisions. (Mears and Wentz 2005, Mears et al 2011, Fu et al 2004)[/li]
[li]Satellites do not measure surface temperatures. The closest to “surface” temperatures they get are TLT which is an loose combination of the atmosphere centered roughly around 5 km. It is also not even a direct measurement channel (which themselves are not measuring temperature directly) but a mathematically adjustment of other channels. Furthermore, due to the amount of adjustments involved, TLT has constantly required revisions to correct errors and biases (Christy et al 1998, Fu et al 2005).[/li]
[li]See the discussion on Satellite data sets in IPCC Report (section 3.4.1.2)[/li]
[li]Satellite data and the large amount of homogenization and adjustments required to turn the raw data into useful temperature data are still being question to this day. Unlike ground-based adjustments which lead to trivial changes in trends (from the infamous Karl et al 2015), recent research shows that corrections of perhaps 30% are required for satellite data (Weng et al 2013 .[/li][/ul]

None of this is meant to say the satellite temperature data is “wrong” but it very clearly highlights the deep-set confusion in the “skeptic” camp about temperature data sets. If one finds themselves dismissing ground-based temperature data sets because they require homogenization or adjustments while claiming satellite temperature data sets are superior have simply been lead astray by “skeptics” or are trying to lead others astray. Furthermore, it clearly demonstrates that any attempt to compare satellite data (which measures the troposphere) to the surface temperature output of models is completely misguided (*cough*John Christy *cough*). It is for these reasons that I will use ground-based data in the rest of the post.

Again, I would like to state that I do not wish this to be a focal point of this discussion. I am merely outline why I will be using ground-based temperature data sets and my justification for that as, undoubtedly, someone would claim I should be using satellite temperature datasets. In fact, I appear to be in pretty good company; Carl Mears, one of the chief researchers of RSS (and the same Mears from all the papers above), stated:

My particular dataset (RSS tropospheric temperatures from MSU/AMSU satellites) show less warming than would be expected when compared to the surface temperatures. All datasets contain errors. In this case, I would trust the surface data a little more because the difference between the long term trends in the various surface datasets (NOAA, NASA GISS, HADCRUT, Berkeley etc) are closer to each other than the long term trends from the different satellite datasets. This suggests that the satellite datasets contain more “structural uncertainty” than the surface dataset

If this is a topic of interest to people, perhaps starting your own thread would be advisable as I will not be responding to comments on temperature data sets on this thread. Now, onto the actual discussion…

 

[rconnor]

They have to do exactly what they're doing, but do a better job of it.

Beej67, that’s quite a sensible post, for the most part. While I disagree with some of the details, it’s certainly more reasonable than most that claim everything they do is wrong (and usually for nefarious reasons).

They have to be willing to listen to criticism, and respond with good science instead of attacking other scientists funding sources.

Valid criticisms – yes. All criticisms – no. So much of the criticism is nonsense or has already been proven invalid and, so, is rightly ignored. However, there are numerous examples of the scientific community discussing and incorporating research that goes against the main-stream view. For example, Lewis 2013 was included and impactful in AR5. McIntyre and McKitrick 2003 and 2005 were included and discussed in AR4. So have papers from Spencer, Christy and Lindzen, etc. been referenced in various IPCC reports. Lindzen, Tol, Christy, etc. have all been lead authors on various chapters or various IPCC reports. If and where they are valid, papers and scientists that go against the main stream view are published, referenced and discussed by the scientific community.

However, what the “skeptic” community wants is for these few papers to completely overturn the thousands of papers that work against them. They continually overstretch the conclusions by not looking at the context of the paper. I’m sorry but that’s not how science works. A strong body of research requires a lot to completely overturn it. Now, this could certainly be from a single paper but that paper would have to be extremely significant, valid and conclusive in all contexts. I’d gladly entertain such a paper but I’ve yet to see anything close to that. Lewis and Curry 2014 was, for a short time on “skeptic” blogs, touted as such a paper. However, as shown in my post on sensitivity estimates, when you bring in the appropriate context, the paper is rather insignificant. That’s exactly what I’m doing in these posts on the “pause” – bringing in the appropriate context. This is a very common theme. “Skeptic” arguments are not always flat out wrong (sometimes they are…) but they almost always are without necessary context. Pretty well all I’ve ever done here is bring in the appropriate context.

They have to strive, through sound science, to nail that ECS number down

They are. (note: further to my point above, Nic Lewis was invited to give a talk at the Ringberg workshop)

in doing so they have to look at other warming factors as well instead of intentionally ignoring or downplaying them.

But right now, anyone who challenges the prevailing view in the scientific community is witch-hunted and ostracized, and that's not doing anybody any good.

…this is why I had to include the “for the most part” caveat in my opening statement…(you were doing so well up to that point!)

 

[rconnor]

Rconnor is mentally incapable of admitting a mistake. Much like his previous argument about the ENSO being stochastic… Did Rconnor ever admit he was wrong about the ENSO being stochastic? No. He simply dropped it the next time he copied and pasted his current ENSO diatribe. Expect the same with the argument about satellites not directly measuring temperature.

http://www.eng-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=378073)[/URL]]Perhaps stochastic isn't the best word to use in the real-world context. You are correct.

http://www.eng-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=378073)[/URL]] An example of this is your first post discussing how “stochastic” is only appropriate in the context of models and not when describing ENSO in reality. While this is true, it is, on its own, pointless.

Usually I don’t bother responding to you, GTTofAK.

Rarely does anything productive come from it.

All that happens is the conversation goes further down the drain.

No matter.

I don’t think you’ve fully read what I’ve written. Maybe skimmed it, selectively ignoring bits.

Did you read the paragraph that started with, “None of this is meant to say…”?

I see no reason in responding to those that can’t be bothered to engage honestly.

Oh well.

This post was fun to write at least.

 

[GTTofAK]

I've read what you have written. There is very little you haven't posted before. I have already hacked the same arguments to pieces in your previous threads. But there is freedom of speech in this world and no one can stop you from spamming the same false claims over and over again.

Example

ENSO does not significantly impact the TOA energy balance

This is false and you know its false.

No matter how many times you repeat the claim it doesn't make it any more true. The current La Nina dominate phase has clearly effected TOA significantly reducing outgoing short wave radiation due to a La Nina's westerly winds blowing away pacific cloud cover.

You strategy is to simply spam so many arguments that others who have a life wont put the effort into refute every single point. I however chose a simpler tactic and show that you are not an honest broker of information. You have yet to even admit that you didn't have the faintest understanding of how thermometers work. As such you have 0 credibility. That the problem when putting forward a case. You cant make such mistakes. If you made that same mistake on a witness stand as an expert no jury or judge would believe a further a word you say. Why should anyone here?

 

[rconnor]

You seem to be selectively ignoring this part of my statement on ENSO and TOA:

Note that I’m not saying that ENSO doesn’t impact TOA at all; it does very slightly impact the TOA radiative balance by affecting cloud cover temporarily. Mayer et al 2013 found that “TOA net radiation perturbations are small”. Trenberth et al 2010 states that “The main changes in SSTs throughout the tropics are associated with El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) events in which the dominant changes in energy into an atmospheric column come from ocean heat exchange through evaporation, latent heat release in precipitation, and redistribution of that heat through atmospheric winds. These changes can be an order of magnitude larger than the net TOA radiation changes” (my emphasis).

So, as I've said from the beginning, ENSO does impact TOA but the TOA change lasts as long as the ENSO event does (~1 year) and does not significantly impact the net TOA over multi-year periods (unless the ENSO state remains the same). The temporary changes in TOA caused by ENSO events are rather irrelevant in comparison with the temporary changes in SST caused by ENSO events. And all of this is rather irrelevant in the long-term as demonstrated by the steadily rising OHC and temperatures.

The graph that you post of CERES data is absolutely irrelevant to the point you are trying to make. An 8 year decline in outgoing SW radiation (i.e. less energy reflected back to space) during a La Nina dominated period. Ok. So does La Nina warm the planet then? Well, no because temporary SST changes dominate the temporary TOA changes. So is ENSO responsible for the TOA imbalance? Well, no because the TOA change is caused by trade winds which fluctuate based off the particular ENSO state that year and has no notable impact on the long term trend. Allow me to show this to you graphically. Here's the ENSO state (using NOAA data):
[image

http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/enso/mei/ts.gif

]

Here's OHC (also from NOAA):
[image

https://www.nodc.noaa.gov/OC5/3M_HEAT_CONTENT/heat_content2000m.png

]

Here's temperatures (from NASA):
[image

http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/news/20110112/509796main_GISS_annual_temperature_anomalies.gif

]

While ENSO can dominate year-to-year variability, it does not influence long-term trends. You're random image of 8 years of CERES data does nothing to change this.

You're not worth it. You say that I'm "mentally incapable of admitting a mistake", using an example where I very clearly (twice, in fact) agreed with your correction. Did you admit your mistake? In mind boggling hypocrisy and irony, you did not. You ignored it and moved on to another example where you, again, completely misrepresent what I say about ENSO and TOA using some random, non-sourced image that doesn't support your point.

I swear you must be trolling. It's the only way I can make sense of you.

 

[beej67]

Valid criticisms – yes. All criticisms – no. So much of the criticism is nonsense or has already been proven invalid and, so, is rightly ignored. However, there are numerous examples of the scientific community discussing and incorporating research that goes against the main-stream view. For example, Lewis 2013 was included and impactful in AR5. McIntyre and McKitrick 2003 and 2005 were included and discussed in AR4. So have papers from Spencer, Christy and Lindzen, etc. been referenced in various IPCC reports. Lindzen, Tol, Christy, etc. have all been lead authors on various chapters or various IPCC reports. If and where they are valid, papers and scientists that go against the main stream view are published, referenced and discussed by the scientific community.

I'm okay with ignoring criticisms that are easily shown to be invalid through honest scientific peer review. I am very much NOT ok with dismissing criticism based on funding source, and there are political efforts in play right now to do exactly that. Climate scientists should be happy to get any funds they can get, from any source, because any science is better than no science. If it turns out to be bad, show why and move on. Every attempt at cracking this egg no matter how it's funded is of some value.

And we don't need to be committing trillions of dollars on science that isn't settled.



Hydrology, Drainage Analysis, Flood Studies, and Complex Stormwater Litigation for Atlanta and the South East -

http://www.campbellcivil.com

 

[rconnor]

beej67, I'm mostly in agreement with that. Research isn’t inherently wrong when it’s funded by private institutions that have a possible financial motivation in a specific conclusion. However, I do feel the funding and possible conflicts-of-interest should be transparent and editors should be well aware of it when reviewing. As you said, in the end if it’s good science, it doesn’t matter what the funding source is and it should be published. However, if it’s junk, it’s junk. Everything else is just adding to the three-ring circus that is aimed to distract from the science.

…hence why I continually try to pull the conversation back to discussing the science, not the politicization of the issue. We can cut through the noise (of the media/politicians) by going straight to the science (in journals and from scientific institutions).

 

[beej67]

See, here's what I'm talking about. Check out Vox's daily scare piece:

http://www.vox.com/2015/10/19/9567863/climate-change-ambitious-cuts

There's a huge problem here: If the United States, EU, and China all followed through on their current emissions pledges, they'd consume practically the world's entire carbon budget by 2030 — leaving only scraps for the rest of the world (the part shaded in gray).

What Vox doesn't say, is that the math used to produce the black line in the graph (the allowable CO2 emissions budget to avoid doomsday or whatever) had to presume an ECS number within the IPCC's range of 1.5 to 4.5. It doesn't say which number was presumed, although I'm sure the actual paper does say it. But whatever number you presume drastically impacts that scary black line, and therefore drastically impacts policy. Yet here we are talking about policy changes because of the scary black line.

In the United States, the necessary cuts would require policies exponentially more ambitious than anything the Obama administration has been doing through the Environmental Protection Agency. Under an "equity" approach we'd need to go zero carbon by 2040 — just 25 years! Congress would obviously need to get involved, either by enacting carbon pricing or other policies to massively scale up zero-carbon energy. This would entail World War II–style mobilization.

So obviously that's not going to happen. If everyone hangs their hat on these doomsday predictions, and then the doomsday predictions do not occur, who loses? Science loses. In particular, environmental scientists lose. What's worse, what if by some miracle we did decide to go to such extremes, achieved the CO2 goals listed above, and then the globe still warmed because we missed something in our modeling? Like, oh, I don't know, that deforestation actually warms the planet instead of cools it. Then who loses? Science loses. In particular, environmental scientists lose.

You starting to see what I'm saying here rconnor?

Hydrology, Drainage Analysis, Flood Studies, and Complex Stormwater Litigation for Atlanta and the South East -

http://www.campbellcivil.com

 

[GTTofAK]

I dont think alarmists really care if science loses. As Rconnor said this is really about "tearing down the capitalist zeitgeist". Of course when pressed for examples of good environmental stewardship of true socialist countries or almost socialist countries such examples are really hard to find. How much oil does Norway produce per capita. Were it not for the close to $100,000 per family in government revenue, mainly from oil, Norway gets their system would be unsustainable.

 

[rconnor]

beej67, I am and I certainly appreciate your concerns of the impact on environmentalism as a whole (specifically wild-life preservation). Now, this is completely misguided as the IPCC specifically lists reforestation as an essential part of tackling climate change, but still it is commendable.

However, I think you continually not just completely ignore the other side of the uncertainty coin (i.e. higher sensitivity) but don’t even understand the favourable side of the uncertainty coin (i.e. what low sensitivity entails).

Honing in the sensitivity estimate is of course important. However, the current range of sensitivity estimates does not mean the difference between needing mitigation or not, it’s the difference between how aggressive the mitigation measures need to be and how costly the adaptation measures will be. Taking the LC14 TCR estimate (1.33 K) rather than the usual IPCC TCR value (1.8 K) would mean, under the same emission scenario, we’d hit 2 deg C a decade later.

Furthermore, you need to remember that TCR is about the rate of warming, not the total warming. Without mitigation measures, we’ll continue to warm past the first doubling of CO2. So without mitigation measures, warming won’t magically stop at 1.3 K or 1.8 K (or 2.2 K). Warming won’t even stop if we magically stop emitting carbon today. Slow feedbacks will continue to cause warming to around the ECS point. This is why the 2 deg C goal is so difficult to meet because we are already at 1 deg C and we know we are locked in for more even if we (magically) cut 100% of emissions today. (I bet that when we start getting serious about mitigation measures and temperatures continue to rise due to slow feedbacks, “skeptics” will say “See! I told you mitigation wouldn’t work!” simply due to a lack of understanding.)

And all of this completely ignores the numbers at the upper end of the IPCC range. Especially as there is greater uncertainty on the upper limit than the lower limit. The PDF of sensitivity estimates are fat-tailed/positive skew. Uncertainty is not our friend.

But let’s play your “what if“ game. What if the thousands upon thousands of scientific papers are wrong. What if NASA, NOAA, JPL and 197 national science academies/institutions are wrong? What if the entire field of Paleoclimatology is wrong? Well, we invest in environmental protection (specifically including reforestation efforts as per the IPCC), we invest in updating an aging energy infrastructure, we invest in developing sustainable energy independence, we invest in improving air quality of urban environments, we develop a keener sense of the global impact of our actions and we support the sustainable growth of developing nations for “nothing”. Could this effort have been spent elsewhere? Of course. Is it wasteful or unnecessary? I don’t know about that.

This is where the political ideology of “skeptics” blinds them. They “know” that mitigation measures will “cripple the economy”…with absolutely no sources or evidence to support that. You cannot simply claim that it will “cripple the economy” and expect me to believe you. Show me a peer-reviewed study that mitigation measures will “cripple the economy” and I’ll show you 5 that say otherwise.

Now, let’s play the other side of the “what if” game. What if that blog you read is wrong? What if that libertarian think-tank is wrong? Well, fortunately, we do have some evidence and research to suggest what will happen (AR5 WGII and WGIII). The economic issues aside, imagine the cultural and social cost. If sea level rise, access to food or other climatic factors requires large numbers of people (most likely from poor nations) to relocate, we have huge social, political and ethical issues on our hands. Ask Europe how easy mass forced migration is to deal with.

Now, no doubt I have some biases based off political ideology that makes this easier for me to accept. I don’t deny that. Unfortunately, I also have the science to support me as well. Furthermore, following the science lead me to accept the conclusions. Unlike “skeptics” whose refusal to accept the conclusions lead them to reject the science.

This isn’t some sort of Pascal’s Wager as we can easily add in the probability of the events being true/occurring. Compare the probability of the first “what if” situation with the second one. Compare the consequences. You know, do a proper risk assessment using the data and evidence available to you.

You starting to see what I’m saying here beej67?

 

[GTTofAK]

Show me a peer-reviewed study that mitigation measures will “cripple the economy” and I’ll show you 5 that say otherwise.

Argumentum ad Populum

Unlike “skeptics” whose refusal to accept the conclusions lead them to reject the science.

If you claim to accept science why do you reject the best temperature measurements we have in the satellites? You seem more than willing to throw out science that doesn't agree with your conclusion. I'll give you a simple explanation of why I think the satellites are better. Its a network that is intended to measure temperature. The surface record is not. Its an ad hoc attempt to piece together disparate and heterogeneous data from weather stations that were never installed for such a purpose. The main reason that the plurality of weather stations are at airports is because their intent is for pilots to calculate lift. The idea that we can use this data to calculate global temperatures to within 100th of a degree centigrade is ridiculous. The data can be used to get a general idea but as it is presently being used is data rape.

Dont claim to accept sciece. You are biased and reject anything that disagrees with out of hand. Look at the above quote "Show me a peer-reviewed study that mitigation measures will “cripple the economy” and I’ll show you 5 that say otherwise." That means you wont even analyze the science. You have already concluded that you will throw it out based on "popularity". That is not science that is pure bias.

 

[cranky108]

Has anyone charted the night time low tempetures over time? Is there any type trend showing there?

It should have a following of the day time trend, but what does it show?

What other data should show the same trend is not being presented? Those are the data points that should show validity to the theory, not the modeling.

 

[rconnor]

cranky108, night time lows are warming as well, actually slightly faster than day time highs (Alexander et al 2006, Braganza et al 2004, Zhou et al 2009, Vose et al 2005). This is consistent with greenhouse gas warming (and counter to warming by solar activity). From [link ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/papers/200686amsp4.1rvfree.pdf]Vose et al 2005[/url] (note DTR means Diurnal Temperature Range; a negative DTR anomaly means that nights are warming faster than days):
[image

https://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/fig/figure3-2.jpeg

]

 

[beej67]

Honing in the sensitivity estimate is of course important. However, the current range of sensitivity estimates does not mean the difference between needing mitigation or not, it’s the difference between how aggressive the mitigation measures need to be and how costly the adaptation measures will be

Yeah, and when you've got Vox talking about WW2 internment camps and socializing entire industries because of the scary black line, which is based on an ECS assumption that's basically pulled out of a hat, getting the ECS number right becomes paramount. Nailing it down to a real number, that everyone knows and agrees on, is paramount.

But let’s play your “what if“ game. What if the thousands upon thousands of scientific papers are wrong.

Oh can the rhetoric. It's not helpful. Thousands upon thousands of scientific papers have all disagreed with each other about ECS and set the "likely" range to be 1.5C to 4.5C, and nobody knows what the dang answer is. The scary black line from the Vox graph under a 1.5C scenario probably gives us 200 years to eliminate carbon. It'd be nice to know that before we start floating martial law as a solution.

It'd also be wise, generally, to identify which political forces are pushing for martial law as a solution, and be especially skeptical of those. Because history clearly shows that when those sorts of political forces tend to gain control, they tend to implement "very bad things." You may think it's a complete coincidence that the same political forces pushing for martial law to combat climate are also pushing for martial law to implement gun control even though we're at historic lows in gun violence, but some people don't think it's coincidence. I don't.

Policy is sticky, and science has never been it's objective.



Hydrology, Drainage Analysis, Flood Studies, and Complex Stormwater Litigation for Atlanta and the South East -

http://www.campbellcivil.com

 

[rconnor]

Yeah, and when you've got Vox talking about…

Yes, Vox articles are very often cited at IPCC conferences and Parliamentary hearings and are the true voice of the science behind climate change.

Beej67, I literally just finished saying “We can cut through the noise (of the media/politicians) by going straight to the science (in journals and from scientific institutions).” and then you decide to use some Vox article and never actually link the (publically available) paper the article is based off.

…WW2 internment camps and socializing entire industries because of the scary black line

Internment camps? Socializing entire industries? What? Granted I spent much more time reading the paper than I did the Vox article but I think you severely misrepresent the article. The only thing close to “internment camps” would be the line “[In order to reach zero carbon by 2040] we’d be talking about World War II-style mobilization”. But this is to suggest how impractical staying below 2 deg C is, not suggesting the US should instill “internment camps”. Frankly, I think staying below 2 deg C is practically unobtainable as well.

Also, the term “dooms day” is your term, not Vox’s nor the authors’ of the paper. The paper simply states, if you want to stay below 2 deg C, here’s what the numbers look like. 2 deg C is not a “dooms day” scenario. The world won’t melt, we won’t drift into anarchy, it won’t be an existential threat to humanity. Nor is 2 deg C a hard on/off point, it’s all part of a sliding scale that worsens the warming it gets. 2 deg C is the point at which the impacts of climate change become more and more negative (read WGII).

The real take-home point of the article, which is quite sensible is:

One final coda: as I've noted before, even if the world does crash through the 2°C limit, that would hardly mean it's game over. Because the risks and damages from global warming go up significantly the higher that temperatures rise, even 2.5°C warming is still preferable to 3°C, which is better than 4°C, which is way better than 5°C. There's never going to be a point when it's time to just give up.

Oh can the rhetoric. It's not helpful.

Firstly, in order for no mitigation measures to be needed to stay below 2 deg C, sensitivity would have to be well below the IPCC range ( taking low values (such as TCR of 1.33K) would only slightly delay the 2 deg C point). In order for sensitivity to be well below the IPCC range, thousands of papers would need to be incorrect and so would the entire field of Paleoclimatology, which requires a ECS of 2.2 to 4.8 deg C to make sense of past changes of climate. Never did I say that was impossible, it certainly could be the case. However, when doing the proper risk assessment it is absolutely important to factor in the amount and quality of evidence suggesting the risk versus the amount and quality of evidence minimizing the risk. That’s not rhetoric, that’s just the situation. Now, I do admit that I worded it to reflect how improbably I feel that situation is. In that, I suppose I injected some rhetoric. However, it hardly changes the situation.

But speaking of rhetoric…

It'd also be wise, generally, to identify which political forces are pushing for martial law as a solution, and be especially skeptical of those. Because history clearly shows that when those sorts of political forces tend to gain control, they tend to implement "very bad things."

No one is suggesting “martial law as a solution”. Where are you getting this from? The Vox article says nothing remotely close to suggesting “martial law as a solution”. You call my side “alarmist”, well that’s nothing more than unsupported, factually untrue fear mongering. It’s nonsense, beej67. You’re better than that.

 

[GTTofAK]

Yes, Vox articles are very often cited at IPCC conferences and Parliamentary hearings and are the true voice of the science behind climate change.

No the IPCC does one better and cites world wildlife fund baseless propaganda.

"The Himalayan glaciers could melt completely by the year 2035"

Where did that come from?

 

[beej67]

Yes, Vox articles are very often cited at IPCC conferences and Parliamentary hearings and are the true voice of the science behind climate change.

Your sarcasm is funny to me because they are the voice of the science behind climate change policy. They and similar media.

The policy is not being based on the paper. The policy is being crafted by who profits from the policy. That's how policy works. The policy is then supported by Vox and similar.

Which is why we have to get the science as dead-on right as possible as soon as possible.

in order for no mitigation measures to be needed to stay below 2 deg C, sensitivity would have to be well below the IPCC range

What does this even mean? We were going to cross 2 degrees C even if mankind didn't exist at all. The only question is when.

No one is suggesting “martial law as a solution”.

Vox is implying it. (and similar) Based on that black line, which is pulled out of the ECS hat. All of IPCC dogma says "stay under 2C warming" and all Vox is saying is "it will take martial law to meet IPCC's target." You can't blame Vox. They're just drawing conclusions from the science as it's being presented to them. Vox's only questionable choice was taking a study at face value that was based on an ECS number that hasn't actually been verified by science. Thousands of papers worth of science.


Hydrology, Drainage Analysis, Flood Studies, and Complex Stormwater Litigation for Atlanta and the South East -

http://www.campbellcivil.com

 

[GTTofAK]

Here is a nice little e-mail from IPCC lead author and head of the climate research unit Dr. Phil Jones on the science behind the 2 degrees Celsius number of the IPCC

The 2 deg C limit is talked about by a lot within Europe. It is never defined though what it means. Is it 2 deg C for the globe or for Europe? Also when is/was the base against which the 2 deg C is calculated from? I know you don’t know the answer, but I don’t either! I think it is plucked out of thin air. I think it is too high as well. If it is 2 deg C globally, this could be more in Europe – especially the northern part. A better limit might be maintaining some summer Arctic sea ice!

 

[GTTofAK]

Here is a nice little table that shows to just what extent the IPCC rellies on peer-reviewed literature.

The claim that the IPCC relies on the peer-reviewed literature is a farce.

 

[rconnor]

Government statistics offices, the International Energy Agency, UNEP, etc. all contain vital information for assessing climate change, especially the risks involved (hence why WGII and WGIII are more reliant on them). It would be impossible to compile a proper report without that data. However, they are not considered journal articles.

There’s a massive difference between those “gray sources”, which are essential and commonly used, and VOX articles, which are not.

Frankly, it’s a bit rich that the blog-driven “skeptic” camp would be bickering over the quality of the sources the IPCC uses.

(By the way, as I was interested in the total number of references in AR5, I decided to look it up. WGI has over 9200 references, WGII has over 12,000 references and WGIII has close to 10,000 references.)

 

[GTTofAK]

Government statistics offices, the International Energy Agency, UNEP, etc. all contain vital information for assessing climate change, especially the risks involved (hence why WGII and WGIII are more reliant on them). It would be impossible to compile a proper report without that data. However, they are not considered journal articles.

Dont forget the World Wildlife Fund.